had stolen from them. bowed beneath the sway of the first Hyrcanus, and consented to reunite themselves with the common stock of Abraham by the rite of circumcision, it was that "they might once again have dominion and break "their brother's yoke from off their necks."

If for a moment they had

The first Antipater secured for himself the place of a vassal prince under Alexander Jannæus; the B. C. 47. second, as we have seen, became the master of His rise. the phantom Priest Hyrcanus, and, alternately siding with each of the two parties which divided the Roman world, mounted, through the favor first of Pompey and then of Cæsar, to the high office of the Roman Procurator of Judæa. And now his son inherits the traditions of his house and nation, and the threads of that subtle influence by which Rome henceforth assumed the control of Judæa. Herod was hardly more than a boy but fifteen1 of ageyears when he was brought forward by his father into public life. Already when he was a child going to school, his future greatness 2 had been predicted by an ascetic seer from the Essenian settlement, who called him "King of the "Jews." The child thought that Menahem was in jest; but the prophet smacked the little boy on the back, and charged him to remember these blows, as a signal that he had foretold to him his future destiny -what he might be, and what, unfortunately, he became. Like a true descendant of Esau, he was "a man of the field, a mighty hunter." He was renowned for his horsemanship. On one day he was παντάπασιν ὄντι — κομιδῇ νέον) showe that he meant fifteen. 2 B. J., i. 20, 4.

66

1 It has been conjectured to read twenty-five for fifteen. But the remark of Josephus, twice repeated Ant., xiv. 9, 2; B. J., i. 10, 4), hat he was exceedingly young (vég

8 Ant., xv. 10, 5.

known to have had such sport as to have killed no less than forty of the game of those parts-bears, stags, and wild asses. In the Arab exercises of the jerreed, or throwing the lance, in the archery of the ancient Edomites, he was the wonder of his generation. He had a splendid presence. His fine black hair, on which he prided himself, and which when it turned gray was dyed,' to keep up the appearance of youth, was magnificently dressed. On one occasion, when he sprang out of a bath where assassins had surprised him, even his naked figure was so majestic that they fled before him. Nor was he destitute of noble qualities, however much obscured by the violence of the age, and by the furious, almost frenzied, cruelty which despotic power breeds in Eastern potentates. There was a greatness of soul which might have raised him above the petty intriguers by whom he was surrounded. His family affections were deep and strong. In that time of general dissolution of domestic ties it is refreshing to witness the almost extravagant tenderness with which, on the plain of Sharon, he founded, in the fervor of his filial love, the city of" Antipatris;" to the citadel above Jericho3 he gave the name of his Arabian mother Cypros; to one of the towers of Jerusalem, and to a fortress, in the valley which still retains the name, looking down to the Jordan, he left the privilege of commemorating his beloved and devoted brother Phasael. In the lucid intervals of the darker days which beset the close of his career, nothing can be more pathetic than his remorse for his domestic crimes, nothing more genuine than his tears of affection for his grandchildren.

1 Josephus, Ant., xvi. 8, 1; B. J., 24, 7; Ant., xiv. 9, 4.

2 Ant., xiv. 15, 13.

4 For the devotion of Herod to Phasael, see Josephus, Ant., x. 16 5, 2; of Phasael to Herod, Ibid., xiv

Josephus, B. J., i. 21, 9; Ant., 13, 10; B. J., i. 10, 5. xiv. 7, 3.

His cultiva

Nor were there wanting signs of a higher culture than any Judæan Prince had shown since the time of Solomon. He had an absolute passion for philosophy and history, and used to say that there could be nothing more useful or politic for a king than the investigation of the great events of the past. He engaged for his private secretary Nicolas of Damascus, one of the most accomplished scholars1 of the age, and author of a universal history in 144 books; and on his long voyages to and from Rome, he loved to while away the hours by conversations on these subjects with Nicolas, whom for this purpose he took with tion. him on board of the same ship. One example of his own philosophic sentiment is preserved in the speech which Josephus ascribes to him, endeavoring to dispel the superstitious panic occasioned by an earthquake. How completely, too, he entered into the glories of Greek and Roman art will appear as we proceed, from the monuments which place him in the first rank of the masters of architecture in that great age of building. His contemporaries recognized in him one of those rare princely characters, who take a delight in beneficence, and in its largest possible scope. Not only in Palestine itself, but in all the cities of Asia and of Greece, which needed generous assistance, he freely gave it. At Antioch he left his mark in the polished 3 marble pavement of the public square, and in the cloister which surrounded it. In many of the cities of Syria and Asia Minor he founded places for athletic exercises, aqueducts, baths, fountains, and (in the mod

1 Josephus, Ant., xiii. 12, 6; xiv. 1, 3; 4. 3; 6, 4; xvi.; x. 7, 1; xiii. 3, 2; c. Ap., ii. 7 (see Ewald, v. 417);

Fragments of Valesius, quoted in Clin ton's Fasti Hellenici, A. D. 16.

2

Josephus, B. J., i. 29, 4.

3 Ibid., i., xxi. 11, 12.

ern fashion of philanthropy) annexed to them parks and gardens for public recreation. With a toleration which seems beyond his time, but which kindles an admiration even in the Jewish historian, he repaired the Temple of Apollo at Rhodes, and settled a permanent endowment on the games of Olympia, the chief surviving relic of Grecian grandeur, which he had visited on his way to Rome.

This was the man who now stepped into the foremost place of the Jewish history. It might have seemed as if the cry of Esau were to be again repeated: "Hast thou but one blessing? Bless me, even me "also, O my father."

A chief of such largeness of mind, such generosity of disposition, such power of command, was well suited to take the lead in this distracted nation. Viewed as we now view him, through the blood-stained atmosphere of his later life, even the dubious eulogies of Josephus are difficult to understand. But viewed in the light of the nobleness of his early youth, and through the magnificence of his public works, it was natural that — as in the case of our own Henry VIII. -- the judgment of his contemporaries should have differed from that of posterity, that he should have been invested with something of a sacred character, as a dreamer of prophetic dreams, a special favorite of Divine Providence,1 and that a large party in the community should have borne his name as their most cherished badge, and regarded him as the nearest likeness which that age afforded to the Anointed Prince2 or Priest of the house of David who had been expected by the earlier Prophets.

The first scene on which Herod appears is full of in

1 Josephus, Ant., xiv. 15, 12, 13.
2 See the quotations in Professor

Westcott on the Herodians, Dict. of
Bible, i. 796.

ploits in

struction. Boy as he was, his father had appointed him to take charge of Galilee; which partly His exfrom its "border" character, whence it derived Galilee. its name, partly from the physical peculiarities of its deeply-sunken lake, wild glens, and cavernous hills, had become the refuge of the high-spirited insurgents, who in semi-civilized countries insensibly acquire both the reputation and the character of bandits-the Highlands, the Asturias, the Abruzzi of Palestine. The young "Lord of the Marches," fired with the same spirit, partly politic and partly philanthropic, which had conferred such glory on Pompey and Augustus in their repression of the pirates of the Mediterranean and the brigands of Italy, determined to crush those lawless robbers of his own country.

In Syria his fame rose to the highest pitch. In villages on the Lebanon his name was the burden of popular ballads, as their Heaven-sent deliverer from the incursions of the Galilean Highlanders. But in Judæa these acts of summary justice wore another aspect. The chief of the robber band, Hezekiah, was, probably, in the eyes of the residents at Jerusalem - perhaps, was in reality the patriot, the Tell of his time, as he certainly was the father of a gallant family of sons, who were to play a like part hereafter.

Jerusalem was filled with the echoes of these Galilean exploits. On the one hand, the messen- B. c. 47. gers of Herod's victories vied with each other His trial in their reports, and in awakening the public apprehension of his possible designs on the monarchy. On the other hand, the mothers of the victims of his zeal nurried up to the capital, and every time that the Priest-King Hyrcanus appeared in the Temple Court

1 Josephus, B. J., i. 10, 6.